#Riftworld

August 24, 2015

CBC Punchline, Sienna Films, Erin Karpluk and Tahmoh Penikett. When someone Googles Riftworld Chronicles these are the big names that come up. This is a project fuelled by a fandom – this includes over 10K likes on their Facebook page [hyperlink] and exceeding their $55,000 Kickstarter campaign.

That’s something pretty substantial when said project only has eight episodes with an average runtime of four to seven minutes. It might have something to do with this series holding ties with Being Erica and Supernatural, but it’s easy for viewers to forget that quality comes from collaborative behind-the-camera talent. The Riftworld Chronicles project, before star power and distribution capacity, started with three filmmakers reaching out to audiences at sci-fi/fantasy conventions.

Riftworld Chronicles is a Canadian web series following struggling journalist Kim (Karpluk) who teams up with dimension-travelling wizard Alar (Penikett.) Alar loses his magic powers and gets stuck in modern-day Toronto. Kim offers to help him get back to his realm, so she can have exclusive rights to his story. The Independent Production Fund (IPF) approved Riftworld Chronicles for funding in May 2014. Originally, the IPF trailer was edited together from a short film called The Portal. In 2013 writer/director Jonathan Williams joined forces with Andrew Nicholas McCann Smith and Laura Perlmutter from First Love Films to create The Portal. The original short was funded through Canada’s BravoFACT program. Smith and Williams had previously worked together on another BravoFACT-funded short called Canoejacked (2012). Simultaneously, Perlmutter and Smith worked together on another BravoFACT short called Dear Scavengers directed by Aaron Phelan. For Dear Scavengers the two had to form a company, and then founded First Love Films. After Williams, Smith and Perlmutter made The Portal the short did its festival circuit in the summer of 2013. The screenings included Whistler, Cleveland, LA Comedy, Canadian International Film Festival, and New York Television Festival. “It just found its mark after it premiered at Whistler [Film Festival],” said Smith, “it really found its audience at the Comic Con conventions.” The Portal played so well at Cons that it won several awards including ‘Best In Show’ Chicago Comic Con, ‘Best Fantasy Film’ Dragon Con, ‘Grand Jury Prize’ Wizard World, and ‘Best Supporting Actress’ Salt Lake City Comic Con.

In the First Love Films office both Smith and Perlmutter talk about the web series easily and excitedly. Smith had just returned from Power to the Pixel [hyperlink], a digital media conference in Inverness, Scotland. Smith explains the conference had just opened up internationally, and First Love Films got the invite through Riftworld Chronicles. Both Smith and Perlmutter have clearly built up a great rapport, as Smith suggests Perlmutter will have a better answer to, ‘Why make a web series?’ “Having the creator-to-audience, no middleman, connection was exciting for us,” said Perlmutter.

Original BravoFACT short The Portal (2013)

After The Portal performed so well with audiences at fantasy and sci-fi conventions, the three filmmakers looked as to how they could translate the project into a longer format. At first, there were thoughts on producing a feature, but the overwhelming response with Con audiences called for a web series. For Smith the web series format works best for their fandom-like viewers. “Who are people across the world,” Smith points out, “who really love watching stuff, and being a part of a culture that is more of a genre culture.” The genre culture audience that fell in love with The Portal would later follow Riftworld Chronicles with enthusiasm.

The Portal called attention online as well as with sci-fi/fantasy convention audiences. Within the first 24 hours of the upload, the IPF trailer got its first boost with a retweet from Joss Whedon. The trailer went also live during the same time Penikett’s guest appearance on CW’s Supernatural aired. This spurred the love of Supernatural fans on Tumblr. “The timing just worked out perfectly,” said Williams, “[the Tumblr community] are very active, they’re super engaged, and just proactive about getting the stuff they like seen.”Smith and Perlmutter calculate the IPF trailer racked up approximately 3.7 million views within a year. The viewers eagerly engaged, because Smith and Perlmutter also compiled all of the positive comments from YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and most notably Tumblr. This resulted in over 98 printable pages. People want this, and even for first time web series creators the format made sense. After the IPF funding came through Riftworld Chronicles still had to strike some sort of distribution deal. For web series, the rules on how to get your content to the viewers often depend on the funding method. Web series grabbing a broadcaster isn’t an IPF requirement, but they do want it. For the IPF it’s another way to guarantee a rate of return on their investment. Writer/director Jonathan Williams recalls this as a difficult time for Riftworld Chronicles. “We kind of shopped it around, and didn’t get that much interest at first from broadcasters,” said Williams, “they were still a little bit, ‘what is this web series format?’” Despite the fandom power behind this project, this is not a surprising response from any Canadian broadcaster. Just after TIFF 2014 Abby Ho tweeted at Riftworld Chronicles to talk about the show. According to her website Abby Ho is a, “producer, digital and social media enthusiast.” In September 2014 Playback Magazine named Ho in their Top 5 2 Watch article. Her most recent work is with CBC as an interactive producer for comedy content. Naturally, Riftworld Chronicles sounds like a project that would interest Abby Ho. During this time Smith and Perlmutter started talks with CBC Punchline. Sienna Films had joined the team, with Jennifer Kawaja and Julia Sereny as executive producers. The talks with CBC continued into October. Riftworld Chronicles finally got the green light while the team attended the New York Television Festival where The Portal was showcased. Riftworld Chronicles premiered on July 14, 2014 on CBC Punchline. The web series is also currently available on ConTV. The distribution rights are divided between CBC Punchline for Canada, and ConTV for the United States. The viewership numbers get divided across these two sites so far, and the options are still open for First Love Films to get more distribution deals overseas. At this point the web series is well received, as it starts the web series festival circuit. Riftworld Chronicles is an official selection for New York Television Festival 2015, Miami Web Fest 2015, and ITV (Independent Television and Film Festival) 2015. Jonathan Williams and Andrew Nicholas McCann Smith are screening the show followed by a Q&A at the Wizard World Comic Con in Chicago. On top of that, the series received its first award for Best SciFi/Fantasy at Baja Web Fest 2015. For a web series hitting the Internet six weeks ago it’s getting some decent traction.For Riftworld Chronicles to get a second season of IPF funding the series needs to establish the fandom is out there. This means substantial views, online interaction, and anything else that result in hard numbers. Riftworld Chronicles has serious potential to use transmedia tactics such as a web comic, merchandise, or even a video game. These and other tactics will be key if the web series wants to sustain itself. Let’s see where it goes from here.